Smoke Compartment

Smoke Compartment

Came across this sign while I was idling in hall of the Providence Medical Center this morning. For the life of me, I cannot fathom why this sign is there.

Update 3 days later. Dennis found a page that explains this. Excerpts follow.

What Is a Smoke Compartment? By Valerie Ziavras 18-Jul-2024

Compartmentation is a passive fire protection feature intended to minimize the area impacted by an incident. There are two different types of compartments: smoke compartments and fire compartments.

Smoke compartmentation may be required by a building code, fire code, life safety code, or some other code.

A smoke compartment is defined in NFPA 101 as “a space within a building enclosed by smoke barriers on all sides, including top and bottom.” Smoke compartments are intended to restrict the spread of smoke from one area of a building to another. Fire compartments, on the other hand, are formed by fire barriers on all sides and are intended to restrict the spread of fire from one area of a building to another. 

Certain occupancies require buildings to be subdivided into separate smoke compartments.

Examples of occupancies that require buildings to be subdivided using smoke barriers include new and existing health care occupancies (like hospitals), new and existing ambulatory health care occupancies (like day surgery centers), and new and existing detention and correctional occupancies. One factor these occupancies have in common is that a defend-in place strategy is typically used. This makes compartmentation even more important than in other occupancies that use a total evacuation strategy, since the first step during an emergency is to relocate building occupants.